When heart and mind work together as our partners, as our friends, and as our healers, self-doubt and self-criticism transform into self-knowledge, inner-growth, and we are most fully ourselves.
Exercises for episode 14: A review of the episode’s main points.
Exercise 1:
Does the idea that we think with both heart and mind make sense? Where do you think with your heart and where do you think with your mind in your everyday life?
Exercise 2:
Heart and mind working together —
- As partners:
- Where do you use the mind’s objective thinking to carve out space for meaningful moments?
- Which practical matters go more smoothly when you add your heart’s insights?
- How / where could you expand your use of the heart?
- As friends:
- This episode tells us to follow our dreams and to enjoy life’s practical gifts. It also says that our sense of well-being depends on our acting from our hearts, remembering ‘who’ we are not just ‘what’ we are.
- Does this make sense?
- How do these two opposites weave through your life?
- As healers:
- How do you use heart and mind to work through challenges when life takes difficult turns?
- What advice about working through difficulties would you give to another that you could use?
Exercise 3:
Note: Work on this exercise on your own, with a friend, or with a mental health professional. Stop if memories arise that are too strong or too powerful. This work can be done safely, but wait until you feel ready.
If feelings of self-doubt and self-criticism regularly fill your consciousness, seek the roots of these unpleasant voices. Did they start with the words and actions of those who abused / neglected / bullied you? Does it help to know that their words and deeds grew out of their own inadequacies and frustrations, not out of who you are? If so, how might you use this insight?